MCA Staff Writers

Poster from AFL-CIO

Today, April 28th, marks the international Workers’ Memorial Day. Observed each year, it is a day for remembering fellow workers who have been hurt or killed on the job and a day to renew focus on the efforts to continue to work towards safer working conditions for all.

Asbestos: a fiber that is 700 times smaller than a human hair, yet it kills 90,000 people a year. Asbestos exposure can cause the deadly disease known as mesothelioma, an aggressive, yet preventable, disease.

Many families today have members facing one of the most lethal cancers, mesothelioma. The cancer occurs due to exposure to asbestos and is the most serious of all asbestos-related diseases. Once considered rare, more and more people are now being diagnosed with mesothelioma. Asbestos can lay silent within the body for years before presenting itself as mesothelioma, and even then symptoms mimic common ailments making it very difficult to diagnose. This is one of the many reasons why the disease is so deadly. Asbestos also has the ability to spread from host to host, carried and transferred via clothing. Mesothelioma is a frightening reality and these stories tell how the disease affected the lives of patients and their families.

What is Asbestos?

According to the Occupational Safety & Health Administration (OSHA), asbestos is “the name given to a group of naturally occurring minerals used in certain products, such as building materials and vehicle brakes, to resist heat and corrosion.”

On March 5, 2012, the United States Senate passed a resolution (S. Res. 389) recognizing the first week of April as “National Asbestos Awareness Week.” Sponsored by United States Senator Max Baucus (D-MT), the resolution hopes to raise awareness of asbestos-related diseases – including mesothelioma, asbestosis and lung cancer – and the incredible danger asbestos exposure poses to health.